Guide

In the UK, and most of the world, dates are formatted as day-month-year, 23 January 2010. It can be tricky remembering to change this.

Holidays

The following is a table of holidays and notable dates for both the UK and the US. (When you’re not in the US, sometimes it’s handy to be able to quickly access American dates, some are easy to forget.) The British Holidays and Notable Dates are linked to information pages about that specific day.

It is good to remember that as Mother’s Day is a month earlier in the UK, to buy your needed cards at that time to send to the US as they won’t be available at the time of the US Mother’s Day. ( The table of dates below is a sample and some dates change from year to year. The site calendar is kept up to date.)

It can be helpful to enable holidays in Outlook Calendar for both countries.

On your birthday in the UK, you open cards and gifts when you wake up in the morning. If you’re employed, you should bring cakes to share with your co-workers. (Despite people's comments to the contrary, it is still the norm in many offices in this writer's experience in 2010.)

Christmas

Very much the same, only at your Christmas dinner table, there is a Christmas cracker at each place setting, which you crack open at the start or end of the meal, for your incredibly bad joke and useless prize. Father Christmas brings presents, and calls Lapland his home, instead of our Santa at the North Pole. Children exchange cards at school, beginning in early December, and charities often bring Father Christmas down your street handing out lollies, collecting spare change for charity. Children also are carolling for charity or their own pockets at your doors. Turkeys are traditional dinner fare, with stuffing and all the trimmings, but pumpkin pies are not common, if you can even find tinned pumpkin.

Easter

No Easter bunnies bringing easter baskets, there just seems to be more sweets in the house this day, and the occasional Easter Egg Hunt.

Shop Closures

Be aware that many shops are closed/shut for Sundays and many Bank holidays, so make sure you have enough supplies to get you through them, especially if you’re not driving out to the superstores which have better hours these days.

Bonfire Night and Fireworks

Remember remember the fifth of November. This is Bonfire Night, or Guy Fawkes Night, similar in celebratory nature to our Independence Day though less patriotic in style. In the Guy Fawkes plotted to blow up the Houses of Parlaiment but was caught before he succeeded, aka the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Don't be surprised if you see a Guy (dummy) being tossed into a bonfire.

There are fireworks at times other than bonfire night throughout the year as well, town fairs, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve! Fireworks are legal, but they are restricting times that they can be sold.

Valentines

We've not heard of any children trading Valentine's cards in schools in the UK.

Rob comments, "Just to add that on your birthday you may also be expected to buy all the locals in the public bar a drink, and that you tend to pull the crackers before you eat at the christmas table!!"